


Married to the Gob

by RandomItemDrop (thedurvin), thedurvin



Category: Random Item Drop
Genre: F/M, Mild Cannibalism, mob movie parody
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 21:54:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29442948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedurvin/pseuds/RandomItemDrop, https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedurvin/pseuds/thedurvin
Summary: Bik's a nobody, while Zel's the daughter of a famous necromancer for a notorious Goblin Horde. If they're going to get married, Bik is going to have to do Joey the Stush a little favor...
Comments: 7
Kudos: 10





	1. Joey's Legitimate Social Club & Tavern

Deep in the Falcopolis, a pair of young Goblin lovers stood in the electric light outside the old Vinegarworks in the Pits of Garaane, one’s claw looped tentatively in the other’s but not quite willing to grasp her hand for fear someone should see. A station wagon pulled rakishly across two parking spots and a war-band of Goblins with purple hands tattooed on their necks went inside; faint music leaked from the open door and the patrons inside laughed at some crude Goblin joke. (Most Goblin jokes were crude.) Besides the sidewalks and parking lot, the gold glow of the streetlights proudly displayed a printed banner strung between the ivy-wreathed building’s old brick smokestacks: Joey’s Legitimate Social Club & Tavern. Bik was in his best suit, Zel her frilliest dress.  
“You sure this is a good idea, baby?” Bik asked his beloved.  
“Don’t worry about daddy, Bikky, he’s an angel, I swear,” Zel said.  
“Angel of death, maybe,” Bik said. A lump rose in his green throat. Growing up in the milder free-for-all streets of Guelik, outside the reach of the warring Goblin Hordes, Bik had grown up with one thing being drilled into his head: don’t cross a Hordesman. What was he doing here? He should have been minding his own business. The problem was, Bik had no business—a solitary Goblin from an unaffiliated clan dispersed into the cracks and crevices of the city, making their way as they could. He played the fiddle, for gob’s sake. He had no business falling for somebody like Zelina Repelli—skin like spinach just starting to turn, hair like burning sulfur, fangs even and gleaming like chrome, and broodling of a legendary Horde enforcer. If Bik had bothered asking his own clan about it, they would have told him it was a bad idea. That was why he didn’t ask them.  
“I’m telling you, Bikky, daddy’s a kitten,” Zel told him.  
“Dire jaguar kitten, maybe,” Bik said. “Wampus-cat. Saber-tooth tiger. Bandersnatch. Or what are those ones with the spikes and the morning-star tail?”  
“You been readin’ too many monster manuals, Bikky.”  
The old vinegar factory had been converted into one of the dreary district’s livelier clubs by Zel’s father in the name of the Purple Hand Horde; the old man had spent years as a chief enforcer until he’d been wounded by a rival Horde during a fierce conflict in the Rhombus of Obin—nearly killed, apparently. Maimed enforcers were at risk of being turned loose to fend for themselves or even taken down by their teammates, since enforcers that couldn’t handle themselves in a fight could get the whole squad killed, but Joey’s superiors had instead given him a fine post to live out his retirement as local Qaapo for the Pits of Garaane. Joey the Stush was not a gob to be taken lightly.  
“What are you worried about?” Zel asked.  
“What am I worried about? I’m worried he’ll have his goons rip out my _phrataalyë_ for his supper _p’sqetii_ , that’s what I’m worried about.”  
“Why should he do that?”  
“Why shouldn’t he? Baby, I’m nobody. He’s Joey the Stush, a legend. I’m Bik the Nobody. He could grind up my _phrataalyë_ with wormswort and fire lichen and serve it to the Police Commissioner and nobody’d bat an eye.”  
“So, what, is nothing more important to you than your own _phrataalyë_?”  
“Just you, baby,” Bik said, finally taking her hand firmly. They looked into each others’ eyes for a moment, his a pale lemonade yellow, hers like grapes veined with copper-gold. “Another couple minutes and maybe I can convince my feet to walk in there.” Zel grinned, showing her fangs.  
“Bikky, look. Daddy’s nickname, Joey the Stush—you know why they call him that?”  
“I don’t even know what a Stush is.”  
“It’s a beautiful tropical fish that lives in secret lakes and lagoons in Hayzak,” Zel said. “Nobody that calls themself a Stush is gonna rip out your _phrataalyë_ and grind them up for supper.”  
“Is he gonna have somebody else do it for him?”  
“Bikky,” Zel said, jerking him sideways to face him. “I know he used to have a reputation. Tore a dude’s arm off one time. Drinks the blood of his enemies. Big deal, all the guys do that.” Bik started to protest that he could name at least one guy that had never done either, but kept quiet. “He’s been running this club for years now, practically since I was hatched. It’s fine, c’mon. It’s cold out here and I’m hungry. Just don’t stare and you’ll be fine.”  
“Don’t stare at what?” Bik asked as she dragged him towards the entrance.

The doorman pointed Zel up to the second-floor VIP room, where Joey and his crew were relaxing, squinting hard at Bik as they sidled past. Zel gave Bik one more second to collect himself before she knocked.  
“I’m tellin’ you, Bikky, it’ll be fine, _ph’ghedda baadid_ ,” she told him. “Just go in and introduce yourself; he never pays me no attention anyway. I’ll be along in a minute.”  
“Wait, you’re not coming in with me?”  
“Nah, I seen Celia and Adie and Dzetna; you’ll be fine.”  
“What do I do? Bow? Kneel?”  
“Bikky,” she grinned, shaking her head. She knocked at the door and it cracked open, a heavy-booted Goblin behind it keeping it from opening any further, a slender gob with a scar across one cheek like he’d been clocked with a morning-star; between his hands an iron-grey snake turned slow acrobatic exercises. “Mykii, it’s me, c’mon.”  
“Me who?” he asked. She rolled her eyes and jabbed him in the chest with her claw.  
“Go eat a pineapple, ya nilbog,” she muttered. He smirked and eased his boot back to let the door open the rest of the way, allowing Bik to edge into the opening as well.  
“I like your little friend,” Bik told Mykii.  
“Yeah? You like ‘im? Wanna say hello?” Mykii said, holding up the snake. He tickled it under the chin and its long tail snapped rigid, extended like a rapier. Bik flinched and the others laughed.  
“Hiya, Daddy, Sam, Stritso, Mykii,” Zel said. “Daddy, this is Bik; he’s got somethin’ he wants to talk to you about. You boys have fun, I gotta catch up with my girls—Ana Piranha just got her fangs sharpened and they used cheap sealant so now the only gob’ll ask her to the dance are the Kurudo Brothers and all three asked her! Can you imagine?! Bye, daddy—bye, Bikky! Ask him your question.” She closed the door behind her, leaving Bik in the lair of a Hordesman.  
“Oh, he’s got a question for me, enh?” creaked the voice of an old Goblin, muffled a bit like he had a mouth full of something.  
“Yes, sir, if I’m not interrupting, sir, please, Mr. Repelli,” Bik said. He was having a very hard time balancing the etiquette: make eye contact, but don’t stare. Both were hard. Zel had told him her father had been taken some serious damage during the Horde wars, but Bik had been expecting no worse a missing limb or two, maybe a tough-guy scar like in the movies. Apparently they had managed to chop his head clean off.  
Like a tropical fish, Joey the Stush’s head hung there in a cylindrical glass tank filled with bubbling indigo liquid, all atop a fine dais of black-lacquered wood. His skin looked puckered and pale like the fingers of one that stayed in a bath too long, the thick juices of the unholy altar bleaching his skin, but his ears’ long points stood strong to show the proud notches of a warrior. Bik wasn’t entirely clear on how Joey’s voice was so clear through the murk and the glass, but it probably had to do with the altar of luminous pentagrams and skulls with smoldering eyes. Zel could have mentioned her father was a necromancer. Bik did his best to bow and kneel at the same time.  
“…Hell’s he doin’?” Joey asked.  
“Showing respect?” Bik hazarded.  
“Listen to this guy,” chuckled the massive Stritsy, built along the lines of a siege engine and about as clever.  
“Get up, ya nilbog,” Mykii said. “Whatsa matter, pal, you come into Mr. Repelli’s social club and bothering Miss Zelina? You don’t like your _p’sqetii_ , come to complain to the management?”  
“Oh, no, nothing like that—”  
“Ha! See, boss? Told you it’s good _p’sqetii_ ,” Sam said. A short but beefy Goblin with horns, he stood behind the bar, leaning on the counter in his shirtsleeves. “Is my level in alchemy paying off or what? Not a gob in the Realms except norkers like Mykii here doesn’t like dried spider-fungus spores. _Porkozio_ , it ain’t complicated.”  
“ _Ziokannë_ , Sammy, all I says is my mama used fresh and I never heard nobody complain,” Mykii shrugged. “Dried, you don’t get that plump, moist, robust—“  
“Can you two shut up about the _p’sqetii_?” Joey snapped. “And quit invoking the fuckin’ Gods, I’m coursin’ wit’ unholy power over here.”  
“Sorry, boss,” they muttered in unison.  
“Fuckin’ hell,” Joey sighed, shaking his head in his tank. “Plus, you’re wasting the time of the illustrious Mr. Bik, and if my daughter’s brought him up here to talk to me, he must be somebody important, right? You don’t waste important people’s time. If you waste somebody’s time, you must think they’re not important. Right?”  
“Oh, absolutely, Mr. Repelli, sir,” Bik said.  
“Doesn’t know his manners, does he?” Mykii sneered. “The boss is asking who the fuck you are. Takin’ your time about it, aren’t you? What do you do all day? Where you from? You workin’ for anybody?”  
“I come from Guelik, Mr. Repelli; I don’t work for anybody in particular, but most things out there are run by Mr. Mochi,” Bik explained.  
“Mr. Mochi? That son of a bitch still runs Guelik?” Joey mused. “Shit. So you don’t work for nobody; what do you do?”  
“I do things for folks,” Bik said. “Healing, pest control. I play my fiddle and cast musical spells.”  
“A goddam Bard!” Joey laughed. “My daughter brings a goddam Bard in here to ask me some question and he wastes my time tryin’ real fuckin’ hard to act respectful. Bet I know where this is goin’; I ain’t stupid. Do I look stupid?”  
“No, sir,” Bik said.  
“Listen to this guy,” chuckled Stritsy.  
“So,” Joey said, eying Bik up and down. Joey’s eyes were sunken and dark. “You wanna marry my daughter, enh, even though you ain’t nobody? It ain’t even that I dunno who you are—it’s that you ain’t nobody yet. Well, you wanna show me respect, we only got one way to do that around here. Little ritual we like to call the Sour Special.” The other three snickered amongst themselves. At the bar Sam grabbed a shot glass, but rather than reaching for any of the bottles behind him—all colors, some visibly smoldering, and at least one visibly writing with a live snake—he tossed the empty glass over to Mykii, who dipped it into Joey’s tank and handed it to Bik.  
“Um,” Bik said. Sam ankled over and tucked a sprig of mint into the glass.  
“Oughta help with the aftertaste,” he said. The leaf wilted and dissolved in the chemical solution.  
“You sure about this, boss?” Mykii asked. “Last guy you gave a Sour Special keeled over like you’d stuck a knife through him.”  
“ _Ph’ghedda baadid_ , Mykii, am I a necromancer or what?” Joey snarled. “He dies, clean the flesh off him for the _p’sqetii_ , use his _phrataalyë_ for the sausage, and I can use his bones to make another of them whadda-ya-call-its, Crypt Things.” Joey the Stush turned his attention back to Bik the Nobody. “Whatsa matter, you come in here sayin’ you wanna pay respect and now you disrespect me by not wanting to drink my head juices? I tell you we got a tradition and you sit there and spit on it. Whyncha just go ahead and spit in my tank, too? Whyncha just take a fuckin’ piss in my head tank? Whyncha just take a fuckin’ piss in a row of shot glasses and pass them around so me and my boys can all have a shot?” As fast as he could Bik slammed the shot, tossing it as far down his gullet as it would go without touching the sides, burning anything it splashed against on the way down.  
“Look at this guy!” Stritsy mused. Bik clenched his fangs to stave off a retch, but instead forced a wet cough through his slender nostril slits; even the cough burned. It churned in his stomach like he’d chugged a flagon of Liquid Sword. If he’d had his fiddle he might have played a spell—Delay Poison, probably, until he could get to a Healer, since he hadn’t trained enough for a full Neutralize spell—but, wait, did a potion cocktail keeping a severed head alive count as poison? Joey and his gobs were laughing their heads off—Joey more than the others, since he didn’t have a neck to worry about. Bik tried to hold his composure, but when the floor suddenly went sideways who was he to fight it? Nobody.

When he came to, he was in one of the VIP lounge’s recliners, leaning back. Zel was there arguing with her father and Mykii—Stritsy was there as well, but his part in the conversation seemed to mostly just involve suggestions about listening to guys—while Sam was in the chair next to Bik reading a magazine. Between them was a silver platter containing a glass of club soda sprinkled with charcoal, as well as a chilled Bismuth Ice.  
“Hey, look who’s awake,” Minotaur Sam said, cracking the top off the Bismuth Ice. “You’ll want to down both of these as quick as you can.”  
“I don’t wanna disrespect Mr. Repelli’s head-juices,” Bik said weakly. His mouth and throat tasted like he’d taken a bite out one of those stone-dissolving slimes that lived in the deepest caverns of Guelik.  
“Brave of you, but go ahead,” Sam chuckled. “Quaffing’s a free action.”  
“Hey, look whose _phrataalyë_ ain’t goin’ to the kitchen just yet,” Mykii laughed. Seeing him awake, Zel scampered over and hugged him.  
“For the gods’ sake, Daddy, why you gotta do him like that?” she said, feeling Bik all over, wiping a trickle of indigo fluid from his nostril-slits.  
“Ey, he’s fine, ain’t he?” Joey said from across the room. “Little joke of ours that we play on all the boys their first time up here. No harm done, and we get to see how you handle yourself in an emergency. You just kinda stood there; I dunno how I feel about that.”  
“Well, Mr. Repelli, you’d just said all that about how refusing to drink it disrespected you. After all that, what am I, gonna gag myself with a spoon and retch it up all over your floor? Jump out the window and run down to the corner store for a Healing Potion?”  
“So you just stood there and took it like a man. Not bad.” Joey said. “I mean, the bar’s right there, obviously we got a Potion of Cure Poison over there for emergencies; coulda hopped right over the bar and grabbed it.”  
“I figured those were yours,” Bik said. “What am I, gonna knock your lieutenant over and rifle through your bar to find what I want?”  
“Why you gotta do him like this, though, Daddy?” Zel demanded. “He ain’t no Hordesman, I know that. He’s a good guy. Yeah, he ain’t gonna rule the Realms someday. Maybe we won’t live in no golden palace or have a hundred pairs of boots made from the skins of our enemies. On the other hand, maybe we won’t have no Five Clan warlock hexin’ it so the fucking moon crashes on our wedding-feast. Maybe a little peace and quiet wouldn’t be so bad!”  
“What’s all this, _pychiina_? Ain’t I tried to give you the best in the Realms?”  
“Sure, daddy, you have. But when I think about laying a clutch of my own little eggs, I think about how close you come to getting killed all them times to get it. Maybe I’m okay livin’ in a comfortable little house with a husband whose head didn’t get cut off by a squad of albino werewolf hoodlums.”  
“So, what you want him earning his living playing little tunes? Maybe if you have trouble sleeping on a straw mattress he can play you a pretty lullaby?” Joey’s tank seemed to be bubbling more than it had been earlier. “Hell, maybe he can paint his face up and get some rolly-skates and be our little clown here. That’d class up the joint, huh? Cute little clown here to amuse us?”  
“Maybe you wanna defend yourself a little, pal?” Sam suggested.  
“Well, I—“  
“Y’know, when I was your age, back before I was Joey the Stush, I was already Joey Three-Shoes,” Joey went on. “Y’know how come? I showed up for my first job with another kid named Joey and the boss said, hey, how the hell am I supposed to know which Joey is which? I knocked the other Joey over and yanked one of his shoes off and told the boss, hey, he’s the one with only one shoe. From then on he was Joey One-Shoe and I was Joey Three-Shoes, at least until my head got lopped off and stuck in this tank. I been somebody for a long fuckin’ time. Now I’m Joey the Stush. You know what a stush is?” Bik shook his head. “Some kinda crazy fish in some lake, I dunno. Bug Sigil himself started callin’ me that before he went to the big house, so I ain’t about to argue, but one of these days I’m gonna send one of the boys down to the liberry and find out what the hell he meant by it. Shit, what was I talkin’ about?” He paused and sneered at Bik. “Oh, yeah, you tryin’ to marry my Zelina, even though you ain’t nobody. Time was you’d just get a flat no, asking like that. Hell, somebody ain’t nobody came up and asked Bug Sigil or Mustache Pete a question like that, they’d just get shot. Maybe all these fuckin’ preservation-juices I’m brining in’s gone and turned me into a fuckin’ norker, but I ain’t gonna do ya like that, kid. You gonna do me a favor, and then we see who you are. You’re from Guelik. You wasn’t born into no Horde and you got that son of a bitch Mr. Mochi running things there; maybe you just never had the chance to be somebody. If people never got to do nothing they ain’t never done before, couldn’t nobody do nothing. Maybe it ain’t so important what you done already; maybe alls I need to know is will you do what you got to do when you got to do it. By the time you’re done, either you’ll be somebody or, y’know…ya won’t be. Y’know what I mean?”  
“Yes, sir, I know what you mean,” Bik said.  
“Listen to this guy!” Stritso laughed.  
“I’m already listening, you idiot—if you’re not gonna add nothing to the conversation just shut the hell up and quit telling us to listen to each other!” The outburst seemed to relax Joey, his rolling boil settling down to a simmer. “All right, smart guy. I got a job for ya, and you ain’t goin’ to no liberry to look up a guide to no exotic fishes, neither.” He paused to give Mykii and Minotaur Sam a moment to chortle knowingly. “So here’s the deal. Lucky Star Horde thinks they’re hot shit, right? They done some big jobs and their guys got a reputation. Nothing takes them down. I respect that, sure. Here’s the thing, though: when I say nothing takes them down, I mean fuckin’ NOTHING takes them down, _q’piish_? My gobs been goin’ out with weapons with all kinds of poison edges, profane bonuses, unholy taints, acid coating, nasty-ass necrotic shit, you fuckin’ name it. We don’t fuck around dealin’ damage that can be healed by no fuckin’ Goodberries, right?”  
“When we fuck shit up, shit stays fucked,” Mykii sneered.  
“Supposed to, anyway,” added Sam.  
“But somehow the Lucky Stars’ve been brushin’ our shit off,” Joey went on. “Last rumble we had, Mykii’s snade should have left Eddie Cubes with enough venom in his cuts to melt him from the inside out.”  
“Snade?” Bik asked.  
“Snake blade,” Mykii said, presenting his snake.  
“Next day, Mykii’s brother Fricko seen Eddie out walkin’ his cubes lookin’ fat an’ sassy as a Human child. I try my fuckin’ best to find a way to cause wounds can’t nobody heal from, and here come these assholes disrespectin’ my hard work. How the hell they doin’ it? It ain’t a Goblin cleric, since the fuckin’ Goblin Church is a Horde all its own that doesn’t work for nobody, and no Horde would ever dare to hire a cleric for some other god ahead of _Porkozio_ and _Ziokannë_. Whole reason I got into this dark arts shit was to cause the kinds of damage that can’t be healed from.”  
“Yes, sir, I understand,” Bik said. He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to say anything just now, but he suspected Joey might have been dropping a subtle hint for the aspiring suitor in the midst of his story.  
“So I had my gobs follow their gobs from a distance like some secret agent shit, tryin’ to figure what’s the fuckin’ deal. Turns out every time they get fucked up enough, they head down to the same fuckin’ place, a grocery store and deli up in the Bronchs run by a Lucky Star Qaapo, name of Frankie Onions. Detect Magics just turn up a bunch of illusion-casting, so no point in just kickin’ the door down to have a look around, plus he knows my gobs just as well as I know his, so’s I can’t sneak no guys in there. We send somebody in there and it’d start a whole big thing between the Purple Hands and the Lucky Stars. I don’t wanna start a whole big thing, y’know? I don’t wanna be mixed up in a whole big thing. Not even half of one. Not even half a little thing. No things. _Q’piish_?”  
“Yeah, sure thing, sir. What do I need to do?”  
“Joey’s still talkin’ about what you need not to do, kid,” Mykii said. “What are you not gonna do?”  
“…Start a thing?”  
“Smart kid,” said Sam. “We don’t none of us like nobody starting whole big things. _Qii Ztrohntsii, lintaire grrande Qohsay._ ”  
“Can youse get on with it?” Zel asked. “You know I don’t like to interrupt you, daddy, but you’re takin’ so long to get to the point we coulda been married by now.”  
“All right, _pychiina_ , all right,” Joey sighed. “So, kid, here’s the deal: I dunno if these Lucky Star bastards got magical amulets or herbal poultices or what, but if somebody managed to get it away from them, hey, that’s a big blow to them and a big plus for whatever family winds up with it. _Q’piish_?”  
“Shit, boss, that’s a tall order for a short nilbog,” Mykii said. “You sure you don’t wanna send somebody that knows their ears from their asshole? I could take a couple of gobs over and wreck things up. You think I give a shit about illusion-casting?”  
“Didn’t I just say I didn’t wanna start a whole big thing?” Joey spat. “I send one of my gobs that everybody knows are my gobs to steal something this big from the Lucky Star Clan, what you think is gonna happen? A whole big thing. What did I just say about them? I don’t wanna start no whole big thing. So, I will never, cross my heart—hey, where the hell is my heart?”  
“I think it’s this one, boss,” Mykii said, pointing at a multi-valved flask churning with liquid, several tubes connected to Joey’s main tank.  
“Cross it for me, wouldja? Cross my heart, I will never order nobody to go and steal something like that from another family. You all heard me say it. If I got put under an Augmented Greater Geas of Truth by Frankie Onions or the cops or anybody, all they could say I said was, hey, if somebody DID steal it and then gave it to somebody else, whoever got it, hey, they’re gonna be grateful as hell, right? Probably grant some big favor they’d asked for, I bet. Hypothetically speakin’, of course. Right, kid?”  
“Sure thing, sir,” Bik said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ITEMS & ENCOUNTERS:  
> • Stush: https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/174849022664/   
> • Rapier Snake: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/176461806705/   
> • Liquid Sword: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/175885967608/   
> • Bismuth Ice: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/174665738358/  
> • Crash-the-Moon Curse: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/636101087202525184/   
> • Mr. Mochi (mentioned): https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/182029685988/


	2. Very Suspicious Market

Bik had agreed to the terms of the proposal: make his way into Frankie Onions’ front, find out how the Lucky Stars were healing from greivous wounds, and bring whatever it was back to Joey’s club to prove he was worthy of marrying into the family. After leaving it occurred to him to wonder what he was supposed to do if it wasn’t an object but a spell or a particularly skilled healer or some kind of enchanted wellspring of healing waters, but before he could get too far into that question he discovered he had something else to worry about: Zel was, apparently, coming with him.  
“Says who?” Bik asked on the train to the Bronchs. Joey the Stush hadn’t mentioned a timeframe, but there was no time like the present to get things over and done with; Zel had ridden with him back to his tiny apartment in Guelik to pick up his fiddle and change into something besides his best suit, and then sprang on him that she was coming along. Bik let himself be lead down to the train station before he could even bring himself to argue. Faced with a Zel who had made her mind up, ‘says who?’ was the most forceful argument he could muster, and he knew how pathetic was: who says? Zel says, obviously. The final authority of everything that ever happened anywhere near Zel was Zel.  
“Look, I got a bat in this race too, don’t I? I already put a deposit on a wedding dress and you know that shit ain’t refundable. I know you got your fiddle and your Bard powers, but I want to make sure.”  
“The whole point of this is to convince your dad I’m worth you marrying. How’s it gonna look if you get killed?”  
“Who’s getting killed? Daddy’s a fucking necromancer, ya nilbog. Meanwhile, I stay home and you get killed, and I’m stuck with a non-refundable dress. Gonna spend the rest of my life in some tower as an old bat lady wearing an old wedding dress, staring out the window wondering when my Bikky’s coming home from his quest.”  
“You’d do that for me?”  
“Sure I would! What the hell else am I gonna do, marry Minotaur Sam and try to lay eggs with horns? Nah.”  
“So are you planning on fighting or what? This isn’t gonna be easy, ya know.”  
“I’ll just do some necromancy. I seen daddy do it all the time; runs in the blood and it doesn’t look complicated. Do some hand signs, chant some eldritch incantations, _bah daabh yng, bah daabh uum_. Easy.”  
“You’ve seen him do hand signs? He doesn’t even have hands!”  
“Bikky! Don’t worry, okay? I been practicing. He don’t like me doing anything more exciting than sitting in the parlor knitting or some shit, but I snuck off and summoned a whole fucking scorpion skeleton the other day.”  
“Scorpions don’t have skeletons!”  
“Well, that just proves how good I am at it! You worry too much.”  
The train station in the Bronchs was right there in the shadow of the Bronchusworks civic air purification plant, its walls decorated with murals of the city’s heroes defeating wind-demons like living hot-air balloons. Bik and Zel headed down Goldbox Boulevard towards Frankie Onions’ place to case the joint a bit before the big raid, or whatever the plan was. The Bronchs wasn’t fancy or anything, but the brick walls were largely uncrumbled, the grafitti was hardly ever obscene, and the multiethnic natives greeted one another freely and not a one tried to pick their pockets. If it wasn’t for the fact that the Goblin community here was run by the rivals of the family Bik was trying to marry into, he might have thought about looking at apartments. Across the street from Frankie Onions’ place, Bik and Zel bought a cheese-log and some pep crystals on a stick from a corner market and dawdled as they cased the joint.  
“Suspicious-looking place, isn’t it?” Bik asked.  
“Whaddaya mean?” Zel said.  
“The sign out front specifically says ‘Very Suspicious Market’, right above the ‘Goblin Meats & Deli’ bit and the ads for sandwiches,” Bik said. “Who does that?”  
“Pretty common Horde trick—cops’d never bother busting a place that looks so much like a cover front, just like daddy’s club,” Zel replied. She nibbled pensively at her cheese log, which was steadily crumbling into salty orange dust with every bite. “Easiest way I can think of to get in there, Bikky, is to walk right in the front door and ask.”  
“Just walk into an obvious Horde front and ask what. ‘Hi, I know this is a grocery store, but do you guys have a secret Horde healing facility here? Why, yes, sir, I AM playing the Song of the Bluff Check Bonus on my fiddle, never you mind why.’”  
“You gotta be subtler than that, Bikky. Crafty.”  
“Crafty like what?” Bik asked.  
“ _Sheh Qaatso_ , figure it out, Bikky,” Zel said. “And I’ll tell you somethin’ else, too, you seen around back where they got that dumpster where they been dumpin’ bags of cleaned-off bones from the butcher shop side of the deli? While you’re in there on your secret spy mission infiltratin’ shit, I’m gonna go back around there and see if there’s anything cool for my collection.”  
“Collection?”  
“Sure, if I’m gonna be a big-time necromancer like Daddy I got to have a bunch of cool skulls and shit all over the place, like a damn throne made of skeletons,” Zel said. “How you like that, your baby Zel on a throne of skeletons?”  
“That sounds like a really uncomfortable throne. You know I support your career, baby, but I’d really like some help here. I’m not even a high-level Bard and I’m supposed to infiltrate a secret Horde hospital to steal their magic. How the hell am I supposed to do that? C’mon, baby, you sound like you already have an idea and you’re waiting for me to guess it. I wanted to wait until I’d slept on it to get my nerve up; you’re the one that wanted to come down here right after we left your dad’s place.”  
“All right, fine, I’ll be the brains and the beauty both of this job,” she said. “All you gotta do is make like you need healing yourself and cuss a little about how the Purple Hand Horde done it. They’ll take you right back and show you whatever the hell it is they do. Once you’re back there, I don’t know, figure it out.”  
“What, just go in and tell them I got a headache?”  
“It’s gonna take a little more than that,” Zel grinned. “I think the best thing would be if I cast Wounding Touch on you.”  
“Hey, whoa, now, baby,” Bik said, nearly choking on the last of the pep crystals. “You’re still pretty new at this. How sure are you that if you try magic you won’t kill me or something? I don’t wanna end of Bik the Stush.”  
“Nah, I seen Daddy do it a hundred times, it’s easy—just puts his hand on some thug’s forehead and they get stabbed all over with a dozen invisible swords and blister up with magic flames. Longer he leaves his hand there, more it hurts them. _Ztrohntso_ , what a noise. You should hear them yell, it takes the gel out of my hair.”  
“How does he do that? He’s just a head in a jar.”  
“He keeps his hand in another jar and has Minotaur Sam slap gobs around with it,” Zel said. “Watch, it’ll be fine.”  
“You want to stab me all over with a dozen invisible swords and you’re saying it’s fine.”  
“C’mon, Bikky, if I’m gonna get good at this shit I gotta practice on somebody that won’t wiggle around and fuck it up while I’m trying to do it,” she said. “C’mon, when we was courting, didn’t you sing at me that you’d do anything for me? You can’t just go in there with a papercut or a stubbed toe or some shit, it needs to be the kind of shit that you need special magical healing over, and I can do it, no problem. I won’t even do your head, I’ll do it on your arm so it won’t be as dangerous. It’ll just hurt a second, _ph’ghedda baadid._ ”  
“It’ll hurt from when you do it until we talk a rival Horde Qaapo into fixing it,” Bik protested. Her hand was already on his forearm, and it felt like a dozen invisible swords was an underestimation.

“Hiya, welcome to Very Suspicious Meats & Deli,” the stocky gob at the counter said, presumably Frankie Onions, based on the smell. “What can I get ya?” He wore a paper apron over an undershirt and pinstriped slacks. The deli counter had a big glass case of different meats and cheeses. At a table more Goblins were playing _Arqaana-dii-Tosqa_ amidst a meal of sliced-meat sandwiches and fried onions; each sported obvious tattoos of five-pointed stars. In a dark corner a trio of musicians noodled endlessly on the mandolin, squeezebox, and babbochitarra; there wasn’t much room so they were bunched up, almost on top of each other.  
“I, uh…ow,” Bik said. He had stumbled in as best he could, but leaning against the counter he had to take a minute before he was up to bluffing his way past the Qaapo. He had to admit, the deli smelled amazing, whatever it was they were cooking in the back room. “My arm is pretty fucked up here—Wounding Touch. Somebody, uh, somebody said this might be a good place to get fixed up? Please?”  
“Oh yeah?” Frankie asked. “Who said that?”  
“Just somebody,” Bik said, fangs gritted against the pain. Unsure how else to imply that he was in the know, he winked.  
“You come to a _qaqaata_ deli to get first aid?” Frankie chuckled. “Heh. Yeah, I might have a thing of Goodberry relish back here to mix up some Goodburger sauce. We’re out of medicinal pizza right now til we get our oven fixed, but we might have a couple of first-aid cupcakes in the bakery case. That what you’re talkin’ about, pal?”  
“Get a load of him!” added a tall fighter from the card table. Did Hordesmen keep guys on the payroll just to suggest who to listen to?  
“Well, I, uh, rumor is there are some things that go on here, and if you’ve got some, y’know, specialized services that you offer to specialized clientele, I’d be interested in making use of them,” Bik said through his fangs. “I can pay.”  
“What, like, you wanna super-size your combo meal or something? Sure thing, pal,” Frankie smirked. “Somebody told you we got anything goin’ besides good quality Goblin sandwiches, you might wanna go back and ask them some more questions, _q’piish_?”  
“Sounds like he thinks you’s a Hordesman, Frankie!” added one of the card-players, a smirking Ranger with a massive combination hatchet-pistol strapped to her back.  
“Oh, hey, whoa, c’mon, pal,” Frankie said. “Very Suspicious Market is a legitimate business; what the hell kind of Hordesman would be dumb enough to name his front something like that?”  
“Why DID you name it that?” Bik asked.  
“Well, smart guy, it was supposed to say ‘Auspicious’ but they screwed up at the sign-maker’s,” Frankie explained through a smirk. “I bought the joint off a guy named Versuvio; everybody called him Very. Very’s Auspicious Market, Meats, an’ Deli, it shoulda been, only they heard him wrong. Buy some meats, maybe I can afford to get it fixed. Anything else, officer?”  
“Oh, no, I’m no officer,” Bik said.  
“Really? You ask a lot of questions for somebody that’s not an officer, officer,” said Frankie.  
“Who the hell ever heard of a Goblin undercover cop?” Bik asked.  
“Maybe the city finally wised up and knew better than sending a Human with a buzz-cut and shiny black boots out to bother us legitimate businessmen. How do I know you’re not a _qaqaata_ warlock or some shit under an illusion spell? Get outta here.”  
“Look, if I was an undercover cop—not that I am—what am I, gonna come in here looking for a healer? That’s not even illegal. I’d probably ask for some drugs or a stolen VCR or something, wouldn’t I? Look at this burn, does this look fake? Does it SMELL fake? Your shop is suspicious as hell, your guys over there are obviously Lucky Star Hordesmen, and word is you’ve got something going on in the back rooms to help out when somebody gets fucked up by a Purple Hand.”  
“Get a load of this—“  
“Yeah, Londie, I got a load of this guy,” Frankie said, his tone more thoughtful. “L’Jack, c’mere and wisdom-check this for me, wouldja?” From the card table the Ranger walked over and took a look at the damage to Bik’s arm. Zel had left a smoldering black mark like his arm had been roasted on a hand-shaped griddle, with black-glowing veins snaking from the palm-print. She hadn’t meant to do it quite that hard, she said, although Bik was well aware of how much worse it could have been.  
“Can’t tell who exactly done it, boss, but I can tell the bloodline—these vein patterns look like a Repelli job,” she said. “Regular first aid isn’t gonna cut it. Gonna need a Garretto Verde Special if he ever wants to play that fiddle again, looks to me.”  
“Shit, pal, some kin of Joey the Stush got you?” said Frankie. “Why dincha say so, ya _qaqaata_ norker?”  
“When my enemy kicks a dog, that dog is my friend,” L’Jack added.  
“Come on in, let’s get this fixed up,” Frankie said, flipping the open/closed sign on the door. “Maybe you remember later which Horde done you a favor? I can tell you we’ll remember, _q’piish_ , but don’t worry about that right now.”  
“Does it hurt much?” L’Jack asked.  
“Pretty fuckin’ bad, yeah,” Bik hissed.  
“Bad news, it’s about to hurt a lot more,” she smiled. “Good news, it’ll just take a second.”  
“Sounds great,” Bik lied. He allowed Londie and L’Jack to lead him into the back room where they did their butchering. There he watched as Frankie picked up the biggest cleaver they had.  
“Swear an oath not to tell no Purple Hand norkers what we do to fix you up?” Frankie asked.  
“I what?” Bik asked.  
“Just a formality, you understand,” L’Jack said. “I bet that asshole Joey Repelli would love to know how we keep curing his shit. I know you don’t care for them now, but necromancers, they can be pretty persuasive. Swear an oath and we can get started.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ITEMS & ENCOUNTERS:  
> • Scorpion skeleton: https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/172055452119/  
> • Living Hot Air Balloon: https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/177933217600   
> • Cheese log: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/187772179116/   
> • Pep crystals: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/641665238251552768/   
> • Very Suspicious Supermarket: https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/626786565011783680/   
> • Goblin Meats: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/181706436972/   
> • Goblin Sandwich: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/181744504717   
> • Skeleton throne (mentioned): https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/174460284798/   
> • Goodburger Sauce: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/169955749034/  
> • Medicinal pizza: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/177534176370   
> • First aid cupcakes: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/170513225388/


	3. Goblin Meats & Deli

Stuck in the back room of the Very Suspicious Market & Deli’s butcher-shop with a rival Horde Qaapo, his buddy the Ranger, and their gang’s resident big-guy-with-no-personality-that-tells-people-to-listen-to-other-people, Bik could see no way around it: if he was going to find out how the Lucky Stars had been healing from the Purple Hands’ vicious weapons, he was going to have to swear an oath not to tell them about it. If anybody could find a way around it, it was a Bard; he could tell somebody else that could tell Joey, he could mutter it to the world while Joey just happened to be in earshot. In fact if he had been able to fiddle a little tune right now, he might have been able to deal with the whole situation better, but as he’d tried to protest to Zel, a fiddler with a throbbing magical third-degree burn disabling half the muscles in their hand wasn’t going to be much of a fiddler.  
“Yeah, of course, I promise I won’t say nothing to the Purple Hands,” he said.  
“Promise isn’t as strong as an oath, pal,” L’Jack said. “Swear an oath they won’t find out because of you?”  
“Sure, I swear an oath I won’t say nothing to the Purple Hand Horde,” Bik said.  
“Not sayin’ nothing isn’t the same as them not findin’ out because of you,” L’Jack said. “Sorry to get technical on you here, it’s just kind of important. Politics, man. Frankie, I think you’re just makin’ him nervous, you gotta ask about the oath BEFORE you pick that damn cleaver up.”  
“Well, I’m gonna need it whether he swears or not, right?” Frankie shrugged. “Look, pal, do ya swear an oath nobody in the Purple Hand Horde will find out how we heal you from this because of you, yes or no? I got the damn chopper in my hand, somethin’s gettin’ chopped one way or the other. L’Jaconda, go get the Djulaarii Bruddas back here. Londie, lay him out.” Bik found himself picked up into the air by the big gob and plopped into a permanently tilted chair like they used at Human healers’ offices. Frankie stretched Bik’s wounded arm out over a wooden block while Londie held him down.  
“You want straps or can Londie handle it?” Frankie asked. “Some gobs, they flinch. It’s understandable, no disrespect, it’s just if you flinch I might got to do it twice. One gob I had in here flinched four times before I chopped him right. Of course, he had it on the belly and chest from some fuckin’ buckshot out of a cursed shotgun, so I was practically shaving the cuts like I was makin’ cheesesteak, so maybe I don’t blame him neither.”  
“What is it you’re gonna do?” Bik asked.  
“What, it ain’t obvious?” Frankie asked. “Londie holds you down, I chop off the problem parts, I can bag them up for later or carve them up for you here—I can even fry ‘em if you like, you’re skinny but you look nice and toned, probably fry up nice with some onions—and then we get the Djulaarii Bruddas to come in and cast Regeneration.” L’Jack returned with the three musicians, who in unison muttered something in Goblinese like ‘ _diizipoh Liiluuzyohnii_ ’; as an illusion dispelled Bik saw they hadn’t just been crowded together for space, but the trio was actually a single creature, a bit like a three-tiered piggyback ride that got melted together. It was carrying all its instruments.  
“The hell is that?” Bik asked.  
“ _¿Hai mai Zentiitoh dii Dolgrimii? ¿Dopliice Goblinii?_ ” it asked. With its free hands it beat on its chest. “ _Noi zyamoh Trilgrimo, uun Tripliice Goblino._ ”  
“Just like a Dolgrim but moreso,” L’Jack said. “Very rare, and most of them are Berzerkers for the rougher kinds of Horde back in the _Veqyohterrë_. As far as we know, the Djulaarii Brothers here are the only Trilgrim Bard in existence.”  
“Wow,” Bik gasped. Despite the smoldering wound on his arm, Londie holding him down, and Frankie Onions brandishing a blood-stained battle-axe above him, Bik stared in wonder; the thing had six arms, each pair playing a different instrument, and a stack of three heads that blended into each other, one’s brow ridge merging into the next’s jawline. The bottom head was having trouble peeking out from over the top of the oversized babbochitarra—  
And down came the chop.  
Bik barely contained his scream through clenched fangs.  
“Sorry, kid, you was distracted an’ you look like a flincher,” Frankie chuckled with a shrug, using Bik’s severed hand to wave the Trilgrim over. They were already playing; Bik could barely hear them over his own pounding heart, but he felt the song somewhere deeper, a Song of Regeneration. It was not a long song, but intricate of rhythm and chord, the three mouths chanting the refrain _rryzhenerrii, rryzhenerrii, ai, tii rryzhenerroh_. Once it was completed, Bik’s pain was gone, his limb had sprouted anew, and the Trilgrim bowed his-slash-their heads, accepted a word of thanks from Frankie Onions, and followed Londie back to the dining room.   
“That’s amazing,” Bik said, looking at his new hand. Frankie was already working with a set of finer blades on the arm he’d removed. “What’s next?”  
“Then we just peel off the affected tissue, and eat the rest,” Frankie said as he worked. “Everybody thinks you should eat your defeated enemies, but all my enemies are assholes, and who wants to eat asshole? It’s friends where the good meat’s at. They’re doin’ you a favor by feedin’ you, you’re doin’ them a favor by getting’ their poisoned wounds taken care of—there’s a lot of love goes into eatin’ your friends. Humans and Elves and such think it’s weird as hell, but who invited them? _Ph’ghedda baadid_.” By now he had scraped the meat from the bones; the scorched hand-print and anything veined with luminous black necrosis went straight in the trash, but the meat from the forearm and palm was cut into lean strips. “Now we’re gonna keep the good cuts, since this ain’t a _qaqaata_ charity, but we’re glad to help out anybody that got fucked up by the Purple Hand Horde, so you can keep the rest if you want. Carving raw meat off fingers is fiddly work that ain’t worth it to me, but if you’re on a budget you could barbecue ‘em up pretty nice, make stock out of the bones while the marrow’s still fresh…or we can throw ‘em out back with the rest of the waste.”  
“Yeah, sure,” Bik said, flexing and curling his new fingers. Everything seemed to be working as it should, but in the course of maybe fifteen minutes he’d been hit with the worst pain he’d ever felt, conned a Hordesman, had his entire arm chopped off and then replaced via magic, and now they were asking if he wanted recipes for the leftovers.  
“Suit yourself, kid,” Frankie shrugged, tossing the unused portions of the arm into a plastic bag and throwing the bag to L’Jack. “Take that out to the dumpster, wouldja?”  
“Sure, Frankie,” she said, heading towards the back door.  
“Wait!” Bik snapped, suddenly remembering that Zel might still be out there looking for interesting skulls. Skulls? Really? Zel collected skulls. “I forgot, sorry, rent’s due soon, I should save money where I can.”  
“I heard that, kid, it can be tough out there for a lone gob,” Frankie said. L’Jack handed the bag over to Bik. “You any good on that fiddle? Lucky Star Horde’s always lookin’ for a good Bard. The Djulaarii Bruddas could use some backup!”  
“Yeah, I don’t envy a gob out there without the protection of a Horde, the ways times are getting,” L’Jack said. “How’d you get hit by the Purple Hands, anyway? You didn’t screw up bad enough to get touched by Joey the Stush himself, did you?”  
“Haha, no,” Bik said, trying to laugh the question off, but L’Jack settled in to hear the story. He couldn’t tell if it was by coincidence or not, but the Ranger had positioned herself blocking the exit.  
“Yeah, this should be good,” Frankie Onions laughed, casually cleaning his tools. If Bik tried to head back out the front door, he’d have to make it past the butcher himself.  
“Well,” Bik said, “what am I, a Bard or what?” He got out his violin and readied it. It would be impossible write exactly the words he sang—it was always the way with his songs, the words bypassed his mind entirely and went straight from the heart to the mouth—but he managed to improvise a song about how he had been wandering the streets as lonesome as something or other when across a busy street he saw a beautiful Goblin-maiden with skin green as mint and hair like burning sulfur. He watched as she crossed the road against the signal, stopping traffic with her beauty, and didn’t even realize that he was being so obvious staring until her friends told him who she was and demanded to know why some no-name Goblin unworthy to step in her footprint was giving her the eye. He had apologized and explained that she was just so beautiful that his brain had shut down, and to repay his unwanted compliment she rewarded him with a Wounding Touch so he would know what it felt like to be looked at like that. It had flowed well because it was true, sort of, as true as songs like that ever were, and he hoped he could remember enough to play for Zel later.   
“You’re not bad on that thing,” Frankie said. “L’Jack, nice song, right?” She pointed at a bracelet she was wearing; before it had looked perfectly mundane, but now a glowing lavender.   
“Nice song, but it’d be better if it was true,” she said. She unstrapped the hatchet-pistol from her back and hefted it a few times, then presented the glowing bracelet again. “Lie-detecting jewelry, buddy. You wanna try swearing another oath? Like maybe ‘if I tell a lie to the Lucky Star Horde, may I get chopped and/or shot repeatedly and my carcass sold for meat in their fine grocery store?’”  
“You gotta pardon my friend here, L’Jack jumps to conclusions,” said Frankie. “So maybe you should clarify a few things. There any changes you’d like to make to your story when you tell it again?”  
“Sorry, you know how us Bards can be—I had to change a few things to make it rhyme,” Bik shrugged.  
“Was it really Joey’s daughter?” L’Jack asked. She held up her bracelet so they could all see if it lit up.  
“Yeah, it was,” he said. The bracelet agreed.  
“Looks good,” L’Jack said. “Was that really how you met? Never knew her before that?”  
“Of course—how else would a nobody like me meet a Horde princess like her?” If he could keep his answers vague, if L’Jack didn’t ask just the right way, he was in the clear—the song was entirely true, right up until the Wounding Touch. The events of the song had all happened months ago, and at the end, when he’d been apologizing, Zel had not used magic but had given him a perfectly mundane sock in the jaw, then when he apologized again she’d asked him out—admired his tenacity for making things right. L’Jack quizzed him some more, but never managed to ask anything that would bridge the gap between the truth and his telling of it. Finally one of the Lucky Hand Hordesmen out front called back to see what the holdup was and if he could get another order of Onion Nuggets.  
“Hold on, hold on. Turn the kid loose, L’Jack, I got a _qaqaata_ deli to run,” Frankie announced. “Just remember who done you a favor, _q’piish_ , kid? We might call on you to pay it back some time with that fiddle of yours. And don’t go shuttin’ your brain off starin’ at no pretty girls, neither, next time it might happen while you’re the one crossing the road and your meat comes in pre-tenderized, haha.” He wandered off to the deli counter to work the fryer.  
“Looks like you’re all set to go, kid,” L’Jack said. Bik had to notice she had never put her axe-pistol completely away, but at least now she was brandishing it casually like it was just something to do with her hands. “I say the old man’s getting soft, but that’s not my call to make.”  
“I swear, I’m not trying to start any trouble,” Bik said.  
“Yeah, you don’t seem like the type to want to start trouble; you seem like the type to already be in trouble and hoping nobody gets hurt while you try to improvise your way out of it,” she said. “Sounds like the gobs are pretty excited about their you-sandwiches; c’mon, I’ll let you out the back door.” Bik spun to stop her but it was too late—she had opened the door and was eye to eye with Zel, who was carrying a couple of plastic trash bags full of skeletons she’d scavenged from the deli’s dumpster.  
“Hiya, Bikky,” Zel said to Bik over L’Jack’s shoulder. “You get out okay?”  
“I fuckin’ knew it,” L’Jack sighed. Bik thought he might be able to dash past her through the door before she could tense up into a fighting stance, but he didn’t know Rangers; in an instant she had her pistol-hatchet out, blade right in his path. Just before he collided, a molar from some huge ruminant hit L’Jack in the head, clearing the path, and was followed by what appeared to be a couple of scorpions made of bones, which slipped under the Ranger’s jacket and started making off with her concealed weapons; Zel had turned a jawbone into some kind of necromantic firearm. Bik was behind Zel now, but he could hear a clamor rising in the dining room. Bik tried to play a Song of Calm Emotions, but either he was shaking too badly to play it or the new hand was acting up.  
“Don’t worry, Bikky, I got this,” Zel said. She tossed the three trash bags of bones on the ground. “ _ **Qrreioh Qohzë dela Qrryptoh**_.” The three skeletons rose—mostly whole, patched up in a few places, limbs slightly different lengths, wearing the trash bags like rain parkas. Stumbling forward, Bik wasn’t sure how much damage they could really take, but the sight of them crowding the door seemed to have stopped any of the Hordesmen from making their way outside. Londie wasn’t thinking hard enough to worry about what he was plowing through, but Zel pelted him with more molars from her jaw-gun and he faded back, growling about how he’d gotten a load of some guy.  
“Let’s get out of here while we can,” Bik breathed.  
“Just a minute, Bikky, maybe I wanna really turn loose for once,” Zel grinned. She grabbed the bag with Bik’s old hand inside and waved an incantation over it, her eyes darkening. The hand sprang up on its fingers like a spider to attack and jumped at Bik’s throat.  
“Your dad was pretty clear that he didn’t want to a whole big thing!” he cried, smacking it to the ground.  
“Whole big thing, yeah, he didn’t say nothing about Crypt Things!” Zel laughed. Between the shoulders of the shambling revenants Bik saw six angry eyes.   
“ _Trroppoh dii qweztoh Ztrohntso, voi Nabiri,_ ” said the Trilgrim, a calamitous chord issuing from the squeezebox, “ _ **Mohrso dyOhqyo! Dohrmitay!**_ ” His-slash-their eyes flared with energy while the six hands churned out a furious tune that sounded more funereal than Bik could have imagined coming out of those instruments, and Zel collapsed to the ground, asleep, followed shortly by everything she had animated with her dark power. Bik felt it hit him as well, but with concentration he was able to keep his feet. Rather than stay and argue, he scooped up Zel and his limp dead hand and took off running as fast as he could.  
“You can’t tell Joey how you got healed, but you can tell him something else for me!” Frankie was calling after him. “Tell him if the Purple Hands want to start a thing, the Lucky Stars’ll finish it! And tell him his daughter did all the work!”

“Did you start a whole big thing?” Joey asked back at the Social Club & Tavern. It was mostly empty, as the rest of the Purple Hand gobs were out preparing for war with the Lucky Hands; Minotaur Sam had stayed behind to help mind the place, but even Stritso was gone, leaving everyone at a loss what guys to listen to. “Because I’m hearing there’s a whole big thing, and I’m pretty sure I was clear on how I felt about that.”  
“I didn’t,” Bik said. He wasn’t quite sure he wanted to tell a notorious Horde Qaapo that his daughter had attacked a rival with an army of undead monsters, but he really hoped he could find a way that this wasn’t his fault either.  
“Somebody did, though,” Joey said. “You ain’t sayin’ who, but you know it wasn’t you. Just a big thing startin’ itself. Big fuckin’ mystery. Did you at least find out what you were supposed to?”  
“Yes, sir, I did.” Bik tried to speak but the words wouldn’t come.  
“Can you tell me or is it another fuckin’ secret?” Joey asked.  
“They put me under a Geas of Silence not to tell a Purple Hand.”  
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Joey said.  
“But, I can at least show you the evidence,” Bik said. He layed a napkin out and set the severed hand on the table. Minotaur Sam looked it over.  
“This yours?”  
“Used to be,” Bik said.  
“Chopped off at the elbow with some kind of big axe, maybe a cleaver,” Sam said, eying the edge. “Shit, Joey, that’s all they’ve been doing. Anything localized they just chop off and use some high-level hexmonger to cast Regenerate. What do they got, a Cleric? A Warlock?”  
“Can’t say—Geas,” Bik shrugged.  
“Well, that’s fuckin’ great,” Joey snarled.  
“Somebody got him good, though,” Sam said, holding up Bik’s arm to inspect the scorched handprint. Most of the good meat had been carved away, but hovering above the bone there was still a sort of after-image of the black burn, smoldering in space. “Who did this here, this Wounding Touch?”  
“Zelina,” Bik sighed. “She followed me; I told her not to but you know how she is once she’s got a plan. I needed a magical wound to get in to see the Healer, and she had the idea of doing Wounding Touch.”  
“My little girl did that?” Joey asked. “Shit! Well, at least I don’t have to worry about you puttin’ the moves on her. She do anything else?”  
“Well, I, uh, sir, I hate to betray her confidence—”  
“What confidence? I’m her doting fuckin’ papa, I should know this shit. I been tryin’ to get her into the family trade for years and she never said nothing about this. Here I thought we had nothin’ in common! She knows how to cast Wounding Touch this bad, down to the fucking bone?! What else she been doin’, kid? You ever seen her raise anything? Zombies? One of those fuckin’ octopus with spines for tentacles?”  
“Uh,” Bik stammered.  
“That’s a fuckin’ yes,” Joey said. “Sammy, you hear this shit? Zeli’s a fuckin’ necromancer! Just like her old man!”  
“Joey, she was unconscious when the kid brought her in,” Sam said. “Magical sleep. I know you ain’t thinkin’ about using her in this war she just caused.”  
“Hey, whoa, who says she caused it?”  
“I’m just sayin’, Joey, if she and the kid took on some Lucky Hands and she’s out here animating skeletons and she’s the one that got Eyebitten, I’m gonna guess she’s the one starting shit. C’mon, look at the kid, you think he’d be dumb enough to start a war like that? He looked like he was gonna piss his breeches earlier when it was just Mykii and his snake, how’s he getting away from a houseful of Lucky Hands if he’s the one they’re after?”  
“Hey, yeah, and Eyebite’s about as high-level a spell as Regenerate—same guy, I bet. Okay, kid, forget who healed your arm—can you tell us anything about who put the Eyebite on my baby girl?”  
“A six-armed Bard!” Bik said. “A Trilgrim. It’s disguised as three regular musicians, which is what set off your Detect Magic about illusion-casting.”  
“Sammy, you hear that? A six-armed—wait, that’s worse, right?”  
“One Bard playing three instruments at once? Yeah, boss, that’s worse,” Sam said.  
“Haha! Asshole better be glad he didn’t Eyebite her with nothing worse than Sleep, too, or this whole big thing would be a whole lot bigger, I’d see to that shit. You don’t fuck with Joey the Stush. Soon as Zeli comes to, bring her in here, I wanna get started training her up properly, necromancy’s a bitch to try and wing. And to think I was worried about you not bein’ able to care of her, kid! She was stubborn enough before she could do Wounding Touch, you’re gonna be the one that needs to look out once she gets goin’!”  
“So, you mean—?”  
“Yeah, what can I say, kid, I’m in a good mood,” Joey said. “Anyway, what, whoa, I’m gonna stand in her way? If she’s over here doing Wounding Touch and raising Bone Bastards—”  
“Crypt Things, too,” Bik said.  
“Shit, if I get in her way she’s liable to send my own body after me,” Joey said. “And anyway, what’s a whole big thing? All this fuckin’ peace between the Hordes was gettin’ old anyway. Hell, if the Lucky Star Horde’s got room for a Bard, maybe we do too! Joey the Stush, Zelina the Necromancer, and Bikky Fiddles!” Bik winced at the nickname—he really hated being called ‘Bikky’, and Zel knew it—but at least he was somebody.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ITEMS & ENCOUNTERS:   
> • Dolgrim: https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Dolgrim   
> • The reverse of Dr. Goomba Stack: a powerful healer disguised as three goombas https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/618383730294374400/   
> • Indicator bracelet (bluff checks): https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/179781628368/   
> • Axe-pistol: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/172808795809/   
> • Onion Nuggets: https://w-e-i-r-d-f-o-o-d.tumblr.com/post/628572261251678208/   
> • Bone Scorpion: https://randomencounters.tumblr.com/post/172055452119/  
> • Necromancer’s gun: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/168819645329/   
> • Trash bag Crypt Things, although technically I think Zel’s creations are basically just regular skeletons: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/182820227235/   
> • Bone octopus with spines for tentacles: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/187627297913/   
> • Bone Bastards in general: https://randomitemdrop.tumblr.com/post/630299160657215488/


End file.
